"Ten Million Won? Ask and Double It" The Unstoppable Developer Salary Raise Relay

Intense Competition in the Gaming Industry to Attract Developers

Due to the boom in the industry caused by COVID-19, developers' market value has increased, intensifying competition among game companies to attract them.

[Asia Economy Reporter Kang Nahum] The domestic gaming industry's salary increase relay shows no signs of stopping. Due to the industry's boom caused by COVID-19, developers' market value has risen, intensifying competition among game companies to retain them.

According to the gaming industry on the 28th, earlier this month, Nexon and Netmarble simultaneously announced an 8 million KRW salary increase for all employees, igniting the spark of salary increase competition within the industry.

Subsequently, Com2uS and Gamevil decided to uniformly raise current employees' salaries by 8 million KRW, while JoyCity proposed a higher increase of 10 million KRW. Ultimately, Krafton, the developer of the game "Battlegrounds," announced a groundbreaking plan to raise salaries by 20 million KRW for development positions and 15 million KRW for non-development positions.

The main reason cited for this chain reaction of salary increases in the industry is the "developer shortage." Especially in the gaming industry, job mobility is relatively free compared to other sectors, as teams usually work on a project basis, and after completing a project, many developers raise their market value and move to other companies. Game companies cannot avoid joining the salary increase trend to retain their existing development talent.

The salary increase trend in the gaming industry is expected to continue. As the spread of untact (contactless) services accelerated due to COVID-19, demand for digital talent in AI, big data, and security surged, leading IT companies to actively compete to attract developers.

In fact, the real estate information platform "Zigbang" announced a uniform salary increase for current employees (20 million KRW for development positions and 10 million KRW for non-development positions), along with a starting salary of 60 million KRW for developers and enhanced performance bonuses. The used goods trading platform company Danggeun Market recently set the minimum developer salary at 50 million KRW, joining the salary increase trend.

Each game company must compete not only within the same industry but also across all sectors to attract talent.

Meanwhile, attention is focused on how much NCSoft, the leading company in the gaming industry, will raise salaries. NCSoft reviews salary increases every March to April and applies them starting in April.

Especially, NCSoft recorded its highest-ever performance last year with sales of 2.4162 trillion KRW and operating profit of 824.8 billion KRW, raising employees' expectations for salary increases.

In the industry, since Netmarble announced an 8 million KRW salary increase despite having lower operating profit than NCSoft, there is speculation that NCSoft will propose an even higher increase.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.